Container and safety closure therefor



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MOLLIE L. SMITH JOHN A SMITH ATTORNEYS United States Patent US. Cl. 215-9 8 Claims ABSTRACT OF THE DISCLOSURE Closure for a container which is secured or released in conventional manner by twisting it in reverse directions but which may be disposed in an alternative safety locking position in which it may have limited rotary movement but from which position it may not be removed without knowledge or discovery of a certain mode of operation.

Background of the invention In the art of packaging of materials in containers, many closures have been devised, varying in construction in accordance with their intended class of use. In one class, for example, the container contents are normally consumed within a short period of time after opening hence they are constructed to be expandable. The well known crimped type crown cap for beverage bottles or the paper disc closure for milk and other beverage bottles are typical of this class. In another class, the contents are intended to be consumed over a longer period of time and the closures are thus designed to be repeatedly removed and replaced, usually reestablishing the original seal to prevent entry of moisture in the air. Threaded container access openings or mouths with mating internally threaded caps are typical of this class and have long been in wide spread use. Righthand threads have been substantially universally employed since the consuming public has learned that most closures of this type may be removed by twisting same, always in the same direction. The screw type closure has probably been used too indiscriminantly when considered in respect to the container contents. No serious problems exist when such type of closure is employed for edible materials, such as those normally stored in the household kitchen, since the inadvertent access to such materials, is not likely to result in serious bodily harm. The household medicine cabinet or other place of storage for medicines, drugs and the like presents an entirely different problem. Most materials of this class are harmless if consumed as prescribed but if consumed in excessive amounts may produce serious illness or death. Well known sleep inducing pills and many other normally harmless medicines fall within this class. Another class of materials packaged in the same way include certain poisons not intended for human consumption. The 0rdinary prudent adult normally stores such dangerous materials in a place of difficult access out of reach of children and the still more prudent adult stores them in locked compartments. Unfortunately, all adults do not exercise prudency and sometimes even poisons are stored with medicines and the like. It thus becomes apparent that many materials, regardless of where stored, should be safeguarded in some way from inadvertent consumption which would result in bodily harm. This applies principally to children of tender years but also to the careless adult.

The problems aforesaid have long been recognized and safeguards have been in use. Probably one of the oldest safeguards is the provision of a conspicuous label which warns of the dangerous contents. This is normally sufficient for the prudent adult, but as is obvious, is meaningless to children who have not yet learned of the meaning of a written or pictorial warning. It has therefore been recognized that a warning, other than a label, is desired and one of the early proposals in this connection is exemplified by the patent to Howell 334,865, wherein a closure may be removed from a container only by an abnormal manipulation of the closure. This was intended, however,

to be used by a druggist or the like for dispensing from his store supply and warning him that he was handling dangerous material. In this case a warning to a prudent adult should suffice but this would not necessarily prevent a child from opening the same container if, by some chance, it were in his possession.

Subsequent to the early concept aforesaid, certain safety closures were devised which operated on the principle that they could not be removed without knowledge of their mode of removal. They thus had what might be termed a secret mode of operation, this, in effect, constituting inability to open the container by one not in possession of the secret as distinguished from a mere warning that the container stored dangerous material. The patent to Webb 3,212,662 is exemplary of a closure intended to defeat the atempt of a child to remove it by providing a labyrinth through which a locking element must move which could not be readily mastered by a child. One of its disadvantages, in addition to being somewhat complicated in construction, appears to be that a number of secret moves are involved which might even defeat an adult from removing it if his recollection of the mode of operation had become somewhat hazy. As will subsequently appear, the present invention involves only a single secret to be remembered by an adult which secret a child would not normally discover.

Summary of the invention A cup shaped container closure is provided with a single internal protuberance which normally follows along a threaded groove on the container opening or neck in conventional manner toward a position in which the closure hermetically seals the container. At a rotary position short of the sealing position the protuberance may 0ptionally pass through an opening or passageway into a locking groove, the passageway being intermediate its ends. When the protuberance is disposed in the locking groove the closure will normally be rotated between its ends without discovery of the passageway through which the protuberance must pass to remove the closure.

Brief description of the drawing FIG. 1 is a fragmentary side elevation of a container and a closure for same, the latter being shown in central cross section;

FIG. 2 is a like elevation, with the closure omitted, illustrating an alternative form of the invention; and

FIG. 3 is a like elevation illustrating a further alternative form of the invention.

Description of the referred embodiment Before proceeding with the detailed description, some of the criteria for a practical closure of the type involved herein will be set forth in the interests of a better understanding of the salient features of the invention. It is to be understood that these are nowise exhaustive, and only certain of the more important criteria are discussed in the interest of brevity. First, the adult purchaser of a container and its content should readily understand its mode of operation which should be simple and easily remembered. The closure should not require undue strength or dexterity to remove it or replace it to its safety locked position. It should be subject to practicality of manufacture and competitive in cost with present non-safety clo sures and subject to application to a container by existing 3 automatic packaging machinery and processes, including quality control and application of inert inserts above the container contents. It should have sufficient appeal to the purchaser to continue its intended use and be devoid of any feature which would stimulate a childs interest in it as a toy. Additionally, the closure as well as the container, should preferably be constructed of material which will not fracture during assembly and subsequent handling, including rough handling by a child.

Referring now to the drawing, and first to FIG. 1, container is provided with a neck 12 having a conventional external righthand thread groove 14, the container, neck and groove being preferably integrally formed by known moulding techniques and from non-fracturable material such as a plastic. An arcuate safety groove or slot 16 of cross section the same as the thread groove is disposed adjacent the last thread convolution and communicates with same by an opening or passageway 18.

Closure 20 may be constructed of like material and also manufactured by a moulding or similar process. Its shape is generally conventional including an annular wall 22, closed at one end by wall 24 against which abuts a conventional resilient sealing disk 26. An internal protuberance or lug 28 projects radially inward from the inner surface of wall 22 which has a dual function as will now be described.

It will now be assumed that container 10 has been automatically filled with its intended contents and the closure is next applied by automatic processing equipment which rotates the closure. Lug 28 follows along thread groove 14, passing across passageway 18 to a position in which sealing disk 26 is compressed to a desired extent to provide a hermetic seal, this operation being identical to the application of a conventionl closure being applied to the external thread of a container. At this time the safety feature is not employed and the closure may be removed by twisting it in the opposite direction in conventional manner. When the container is sold, the safety feature may be explained and demonstrated by the salesman or the container or closure may bear a label, preferably easily removable, which explains the manner of repositioning the closure at its safety position. Such instruction should in effect advise the purchaser to remove the cap and note the presence of slot 16, opening 18 and lug 28. He should then be instructed to reapply the cap with a slight axial pressure toward the container until the lug is aligned with opening 18 which will easily be detected since the axial pressure will now permit the closure to move in an axial direction, A twist in either direction away from registry of the lug and opening will then place the closure in safety position.

Let it now be assumed that a child attempts to remove the closure. If he should first apply only an axial force it is, of course, locked. An attempt at rotation would probably next follow and, if the lug is not already at one end of the slot, it will be moved to such position. Reverse rotation would next be expected, in which case, the lug would be moved to the opposite end of the slot. Repeated rotation in opposite directions would thus retain the lug in locking position and disinterest would be expected to soon follow. The efficiency of the safety feature is founded upon the high probability that a child would not discover that combined forces, rotary and axial, must be applied to find the passageway. This, of course, is known to the adult who applies the combined forces until the passageway is found, whereupon the lug is lifted back into the container thread groove and the closure removed in normal manner.

And so far described, lug 28 may be of any cross section which will loosely fit and follow the threaded groove, the passageway, and the safety slot. An optional refinement, as shown in FIG. 3, involves constructing lug 28A of generally diamond shape cross section and providing pairs of opposed depressions 30 adjacent the ends of slot 16A. Since the closure is preferably of plastic material and hence resilient, opposed corners of the lug may be proportioned to resiliently engage the depressions and form a positive lock, which in some cases, depending upon the child, will preclude rotation of the closure. If desired, but not shown, groove 16A may be widened between the pairs of depressions so that when the lug moves away from same the rotational resistance is uniform across the groove, thus obviating any difference in feel as the lug passes across the groove and passageway.

FIG. 2 illustrates another form of the invention in which groove 16B is disposed at a slight angle to the mouth axis, generally paralleling the thread groove. In this construction if lug 28 is moved toward end 32 it will tighten the seal in the same manner had it been disposed in the thread groove at a point beyond passageway 18. A further feature is that the closure may be reapplied in a combined safety locking position and hermetically sealing position. Optionally, thread groove 14 may terminate adjacent opening 18 and the container sold with the lug in the safety and hermetically sealing position as just described.

In the various constructions so far described, thread groove 14, passageway 18, and locking groove 16 are disposed on the container neck and the lug 28 on the closure. This construction is generally preferred since it simplifies the dies required in manufacture of the container and closure. It is to be understood, however, that it is within the purview of the invention to reverse this construction, disposing the lug on the container neck, the thread groove, passageway, and locking groove being on the inside surface of the closure.

Obviously many modifications and variations of the present invention are possible in the light of the above teachings. It is therefore to be understood that within the scope of the appended claims the invention may be practiced otherwise than as specifically described.

What is claimed is:

1. In a container having an annular wall with an outer surface, the wall defining an opening into the container, and a closure having an annular wall with an inner surface rotatably surrounding the first named annular wall and having an end wall for same, the improvements in combination, comprising;

(a) a thread on one of the surfaces, providing a spiral groove between adjacent convolutions thereof,

(b) a lug on the other surface adapted to move around said spiral groove,

(c) an arcuate groove, having limit stop ends, disposed axially beyond said spiral groove,

(d) and a passageway extending between the spiral groove and the arcuate groove through which said lug may axially pass, said passageway being disposed intermediate of and spaced from said limit ends,

(e) the construction and arrangement being such that when said closure is rotated to near closed position, a slight axial pressure thereon permits said lug to move through said passageway into said arcuate groove, and further rotation in either direction moves it to one of said limit ends, alternate reverse rotation thereafter, without application of axial pressure in an opposite direction, effecting movement of the lug between said limit ends, thereby retaining the closure in a locked safety position.

2. The combination as set forth in claim 1 wherein the thread is on the container and the lug is on the closure.

3. The combination as set forth in claim 1 wherein the spiral groove continues beyond said passageway, whereby said lug may optionally be moved thereacross into a nonsafety position and thereafter be reversely moved to a safety position.

4. The combination as set forth in claim 3, including a closure seal adapted to be compressed when said lug is moved beyond said passageway.

5. The combination as set forth in claim 1 wherein said arcuate groove is disposed in a plane perpendicular to the axis of the closure.

6. The combination as set forth in claim 1 wherein said arcuate groove is disposed in a plan angularly disposed to the axis of the closure and generally equidistant from the spiral groove, and a compressible closure seal, the construction and arrangement being such that when the lug is moved into said arcuate groove and rotated toward sealing position said closure seal is compressed, reversed rotation permitting said closure to move away from sealing 10 provide releasable detent locks near opposite ends of the 15 arcuate groove.

References Cited UNlTED STATES PATENTS 10/1965 Webb 2l59 6/1969 Lewis H 2159 JOSEPH R. LECLAIR, Primary Examiner G. T. HALL, Assistant Examiner U.S. Cl. X.R. 21543 

